Welcome to our classroom blog! Our blog is like a journal, a never ending account and record of all the exciting adventures we experience in Kindergarten. We are an enthusiastic group of people who care about each other and the world. We hope you enjoy reading, listening and watching what we do!

Friday, October 30, 2009

This afternoon all of the Kindergarten classes paraded around the school in celebration of the fall harvest and in recognition of the season of fall! Thanks so very much for all of your help with this special activity. Happy Fall!

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Today every child who applied for a library card received one from the town librarian. Please check your child's backpack for a white envelope. On Friday a special flyer will be coming home giving you information about special events that are happening at the library in November. I hope you are all able to take the time to visit the library and check out books to encourage your child to read.

In Kindergarten we have a number corner that helps us learn about the days of the week, the date, numbers, counting, patterning and we even get to graph the weather! Number Corner is part of the math program we use in Kindergarten. The name of the program is Bridges. If you want you can go to the bridges website and read about some of the exciting things we do during math time! I will post the bridges math link under our Favorite Link section of our blog.

This afternoon we visited Ms. Munt's 1st and 2nd grade classroom in Discovery House. Every week we partner read with an older child. This is lots of fun and we get a chance to listen to a great story as well as practice reading aloud ourselves.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

The children were each given a random number of yellow and orange pumpkins to create their own pumpkin patch. Some of the children created graphs with rows and columns, while others created a diagram. Some of the children labeled their work and even circled the solution! Later in the day we listened to each child's mathematical thinking behind their pumpkin patch. This was a wonderful way to hear about all the different math strategies and math thinking that we all used.

Friday, October 16, 2009

This morning in Kindergarten during our exploration time we had opportunities to put together puzzles. Some of the puzzles had characters in them from Eric Carle's Books and some had numbers in them. Puzzles are great for us to exercise our minds and our fingers.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Another station during our Exploration was an opportunity to draw, write, color, etc. A group of creative Kindergarten children went to pick out supplies in the writing area, the recycle bin and a cupboard in the classroom that has other items that we have. The children created necklaces, bracelets, signs for doors and their families. I observed wonderful language that encouraged cooperation, respect and empathy.

One of the things I love about Kindergarten is how enthusiastic and engaged the children are when they have opportunities to make choices about their learning and create their own expectations and guidelines for learning. We are involved in a community class project which involves the food shelf. The children and their families are donating food for the food shelf in Williston. So far we have read information about what a food shelf is, it's importance and the difference that it makes for others in our community. The children have been very involved with this project. During their exploration time they decided to set up a food shelf. It was wonderful to watch and listen to how they planned to feed as many people as they could and how important it was to let anyone come and eat anytime their tummies were hungry!

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Yesterday we learned about the different types of pumpkins and their seeds. We talked about how a pumpkin grows and what happens when the soil gets too cold or too wet. At the end of our trip we were able to visit the corn maze. Be sure to ask your child about all of the clues we had to figure out.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

This morning everyone did a great job reading Just Right Books from their Reading Bins. Reader's Workshop happens everyday. We read familiar stories, we read with a partner, sometimes we read by ourselves. We love reading books. Enjoy listening to us read.

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

This morning during our exploration time some of us put together a puzzle of a big red fire truck. Other children dressed up as firemen and pretended to put out a fire. I enjoyed listening to the language that the children were using to problem solve and how to save people!

Later this morning we read a breat story about Curious George and his visit to the fire station.

We welcome Ashlee Trayah who is a student at Champlain Valley High School. She is part of a great program called The Buddy Program. Ashlee will visit Kindergarten weekly to help us with special projects.

Our walk over to the fire station yesterday was very fun and we learned a lot about fire safety.The children were able to see where the firemen slept, ate and we even watched a fireman slide down the pole!

Friday, October 2, 2009

This morning we practiced working independently at different stations in Kindergarten. Some of us worked on Lexia with Mrs. Pouliot. This is a researched based computer program to help children strengthen their skills with sounds and letters. Some of us worked on a nursery rhyme about ourselves, some of us read books in our Just Right Book Bins and others were practicing writing letters with our tool kits. We did an amazing job! We learned how to solve problems when we had a ?, how to share and work with others and the importance of having great focus when doing 'hard thinking".